Charlie Bucket and His Amazing Friends
by Truec
Summary: Dahl started out with the idea that the other children were horrible little monsters. If they were a little less bad, and they helped each other, what strains of madness might overtake the Wonka Candy Company?


Perhaps it was just a quirk of timing. Maybe just excitement got the better of them. Whatever the reason, Charlie Bucket and his grandfather had arrived outside the iron gates of the famous Wonka candy factory a full two hours before ten o'clock, the designated time that their tour of the factory, personally led by the reclusive genius himself, Willy Wonka, would begin.

Naturally, the first time the factory doors would open, and Wonka would appear in public in years had caused some commotion. A huge crowd was already forming, news crews were preparing cameras and microphones. For all that it was the outside of the candy factory (not just a factory, THE candy factory), it seemed to Charlie to be a scary, dark place. The sun seemed to shine only on the other side of the fence, on the factory side.

It is an odd fact of childhood that sometimes, children in a similar circumstance will avoid each other. Where they could greet each other and make new friends, they will instead sit alone, or with their parents, and do their best to studiously ignore each other.

But other times! Other times those same children will seek each other out, and from such interactions are the seeds planted. And a good first impression can overcome a great deal of negativity later.

It was during the two hour long wait before the factory door opened that Charlie met Augustus Gloop: "You've tried his Whipple-Scrumptious Fudgemallow bars? They're my favorite!" "Ja, mein favorite too! But I was talking to the candy man back home in Dusselheim, he thinks mein dark chocolate and cherry invention might be just as good…"

And Violet Beauregarde:

"Wonka bars are good, I'm more of a gum person myself. But I'd love to know how he works, Wonka's a genius the way he runs his business!" "You know the way I hear, it nobody's been in or out of the factory in years, but he just keeps putting out bigger and better candy in more places…"

And Mike Teevee:

"It's funny though, everybody knows Mr. Wonka and his Candy, I don't think I've ever seen an ad from him ever." "Yeah sure Wonka's a genius, but he's all about the word of mouth. He never did his own advertising, even the golden tickets thing was all just covered by the news because it was so surprising. It works for Wonka when he does big stuff like this, but he needs to take advantage of technology, like TV…"

And Veruca Salt:

"It's going to be so incredible meeting him and finding out how he has so many great ideas and makes them real!" "Well of course Wonka makes all kinds of incredible things, he's rich! He has all the time and money in the world to do anything he wants. My daddy always says that all the ideas in the world won't amount to anything if you can't get them to somebody with the means to make them happen…"

And perhaps Veruca did eye Charlie like he was worth less in his shabby sweater and scarf (it was his best sweater, and his only scarf), and maybe Violet did call Augustus "the little fat boy", and maybe Mike annoyed everyone by whipping his toy guns out every other sentence, and maybe Augustus spent the whole time eating sweets. But Veruca also admired Violet's hat and asked where she'd bought it. And Violet had been fascinated by Charlie's secondhand stories from Grandpa Joe about the factory. Mike was the first to remember everybody's names and tried to include them all in the conversation. And Augustus was as happy to share his sweets as he was eating them. Under the watchful (and maybe a little confused) eyes of their assorted parents and grandparent, the five children presented a united front when at last the awaited time arrived, the door opened, and Willy Wonka himself limped, fell, and tumbled his way to stand before them.

"Ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls: The Chocolate Room," Wonka told them as the great door behind the musical lock opened, and the capitals had been in his voice.

"Inside of this room, all of my dreams become realities, and some of my realities become dreams. And almost everything you'll see is eatable… edible… I mean you can eat almost everything," he had described the room, and it had been the truth. Every plant, every blade of grass, every mushroom and rock and twig. And the river. Augustus had been entranced by the river while he tried a bit of everything in the Room, wandering closer to the river as he munched. And when he reached the river, he just had to try a sip. It was alright, Wonka had said everything was edible, and would have warned them if that didn't include the river.

And then he tried the river. It was pure, smooth, rich Wonka chocolate, but in its purest, smoothest, richest form. Forget the bars, Wonka should just bottle and sell his chocolate just like this! He heard mama tell him to save room, as if he could ever run out of room for candy. He heard Herr Wonka say as he ran up not to touch the chocolate, although he'd already gotten both hands into it by that point. One more handful wouldn't hurt anything.

It was when Wonka had pulled up right behind him that Augustus fell forward into the river.

He had fallen, right? Surely, Wonka hadn't… he wouldn't have… no, he had been so concerned about hands in his river, an entire little boy would be far worse.

Of course, such thoughts were for later, this was the time for unthinking panic. Augustus had never learned to swim. And the river, so placid on the surface, had a terrible current down below, trying to pull him under.

But where only one little boy might have tried and failed to save Augustus, instead four innovative children stepped up, providing a giant lollipop from one tree and a thick licorice vine from another. Mike turned out to be able to quickly fashion a lasso, and to be fairly deft at throwing one, and together the children and adults (except for Wonka, who stood back, munching on one of his own chocolate bars) pulled him close enough to grab the lollipop stick held out by Charlie and Grandpa Joe. Eventually, Augustus was pulled up onto dry land again, soaked through with runny liquid chocolate, but unharmed.

"I'm sorry about your chocolate Herr Wonka, I didn't realize it wasn't safe to touch it," the little German boy apologize profusely as his mother wiped runny chocolate off him with a towel a passing Oompa-Loompa handed her.

"Hmm? Oh, yes, that," Wonka seemed almost… disappointed? "The chocolate gets boiled before it goes into any of my candy anyway, and a bit of Augustus Gloop in it is bound to provide something special in the flavor, but I should probably have it filtered later... still, we can discuss the matter later."

Wonka had pulled aside an Oompa-Loompa and whispered something Charlie hadn't quite caught, something about "more seats", but was distracted minutes later as a boat, a full-sized paddle boat, came sailing down the chocolate river.

He wasn't sure what the Oompa-Loompas peddling the boat's paddle were singing under their breath as he took a seat between Grandpa Joe and Veruca, but it was awfully catchy. "Oompa-Loompa doompa-dee doo…"

The tunnel Wonka's boat had taken them through was like the man himself. Strange and scary and fun and bizarre, but ultimately harmless. At one point Veruca had shrieked and grabbed his arm, something Charlie wasn't entirely certain how to feel about.

And then there had been another of Wonka's rooms. After the Chocolate Room, Charlie and the other kids were prepared to see just about anything.

"Der Inventing Room. Now remember, no messing about," this was hard to take coming from Wonka. "No touching, no tasting, no telling," was another odd instruction following the Chocolate Room, where they'd been encouraged to do all three. "All of my most secret inventions are cooking and simmering in here. Old Slugworth would give his false teeth for five minutes in here."

It was every bit as incredible as the Chocolate Room, but it was a completely different kind of incredible. This was where Wonka's genius happened, where he invented his brilliant inventions. Violet had pushed her way to the front, clearly wanting to see how a mind like Wonka's operated, but Augustus had gotten in front of her somehow, and was still rather sticky and chocolatey for her to try and push past. The room was filled with whistling, steaming contraptions of every description. Wonka had stopped to do a bit of mixing, trying to explain his inventing process to people who clearly weren't… Wonka enough to understand. Charlie and Veruca agreed that the man was absolutely bonkers, but that it clearly worked for him.

And then, there had been the top-secret machine. Wonka had put on a pretense of not showing it to them, but clearly only to build up suspense. For a recluse, the man was as brilliant a showman as he was a candy maker. And somehow, as soon as the multicolored and multifaceted candies came out of the machine, Charlie knew. He said it to himself even as Wonka said it out loud.

"It makes Everlasting Gobstoppers!"

Charlie remembered his conversation with the scarred man in the tunnel who had called himself Slugworth. The man had offered thousands for just one of these Everlasting Gobstoppers. And here was Wonka just giving them to the children. He handed one to Violet and Veruca and Mike and Charlie, before his eyes swept over Augustus. One of Wonka's boots kicked back at the machine, which squeaked once more, and a fifth Gobstopper rolled out, which was handed to him.

Wonka made the children swear to keep the Gobstoppers for themselves, and never show them to anybody else. Charlie swore, and the rest did too, but he saw the looks on their faces when Wonka said "Everlasting Gobstopper", and he was sure the same look had been on his face. They had all been anticipating seeing this latest Wonka invention. But he wouldn't sell Mr. Wonka out to Slugworth, and Charlie was certain the others wouldn't either.

And then there had been the gum.

It was a fantastic machine, certainly. The onlookers watched as tomatoes were souped, beef was roasted, and blueberries were pied, but Wonka was a candy maker, not a restaurateur, and no one could guess how this fit into his business model. And Wonka, as cagey about explaining this as he had been about everything else, only promised how revolutionary the machine was.

Naturally, it had been Violet who first recognized the final product ("By gum, it's gum!"), and had immediately wanted to try it. Wonka had let the girl take the gum from him with only a warning of "I wouldn't do that, I really wouldn't", before leaning back to watch the girl chomp into the gum.

As Violet described the feeling of eating a three-course meal in the form of chewing gum, Charlie furrowed his brow and looked at the candy man. "Mr. Wonka, what did you mean when you said it wasn't ready yet? It sounds like it's great."

And Wonka had looked up from where he had been fiddling with another of his inventions. "Hmm? Oh, it's got side effects. Turned all the Oompa-Loompas who tried it so far into giant blueberries."

Such an abrupt and bizarre answer and been enough to leave even Violet's jaw hanging open long enough for Mike to knick the half-chewed gum out of her mouth. "Better stick with your three-month record gum and wait until Wonka finishes this one."

Violet could only nod as she slipped her old reliable piece of gum out from behind her ear and back into her mouth. Giant blueberries? It would be insane anywhere else… but this was Wonka country. As they filed out of the room, she heard the Oompa-Loompas behind them starting to sing quietly, too quietly to catch the words. Very catchy tune though.

By comparison to the Inventing Room, Wonka's lickable wallpaper was… well, no, it was still pretty incredible. And then there had been the Fizzy Lifting Drinks. Wonka had said it was still too powerful for them to try, and heedless of their pleas to try some, had shuffled them along to the next spot on the tour.

But Grandpa Joe and held Charlie back a moment. "Let's take a drink Charlie, nobody's watching," the old man had said, lifting a bottle of the Drink and popping it open, watching as it bubbled away like shaken up soda, but straight up.

And Charlie was tempted. This was probably safe, they would just float in the air, Wonka said, nothing dangerous like being sucked under a river of chocolate or turning into a blueberry. And it sounded like such fun…

And then a voice called from up ahead. "Hey Charlie, are you coming?"

That decided it, Charlie wanted to keep up with his friends. "Later Grandpa, let's catch up."

Overall, Charlie was happy with his choice. He wouldn't have wanted to miss seeing this. "The geese that lay the golden eggs," Wonka said. And apparently the gold was also chocolate? The children had learned not to bother with questions by this point.

Unfortunately, the geese were enough to get Veruca excited. And anything that excited Veruca could only have one result. "I want one!" she begged her father. And Mr. Salt had pulled out his checkbook and asked Wonka to name his price. Veruca wasn't used to being told she couldn't have something, and her father wasn't used to being told he couldn't buy something. Neither was entirely happy with Wonka's answer of "They're not for sale. She can't have one."

And so Veruca had pitched a tantrum, strewing Easter basket materials all over the Egg Room, nearly wrapping Wonka in cellophane wrapping. Charlie almost thought he could hear a song in her whining, as he thought he'd heard one when Wonka had talked about imagination, back in the Chocolate Room.

But even the most spoiled child of the richest and most permissive parents can't have every single thing she wants, and Veruca eventually calmed down from a tyrant to a snit. With some prodding from Charlie and Augustus, she even offered up an apology to Wonka for the mess she made. Wonka simply waved her off and continued the tour.

And then Wonka had revealed his Wonkamobile. An old-fashioned copper boiler took up most of the oversized car, with seating wherever it would fit (and why did it look like an additional bench seat had been bolted onto either side on short notice?). The Wonkamobile covered them all in thick, cold, sticky foam… only for it to immediately be removed, leaving them all spotlessly clean (even the formerly chocolate-covered Augustus) in a process that Wonka called the Hsaw Aknow, and would only explain when pressed further that it was "Wonka Wash" spelled backward, with no indicator what that meant. The Wonkamobile ride had only been a few hundred feet, all told.

An Oompa-Loompa ran up to them as they reached the entrance of the next room, carrying white suits and booties (how odd that there had been enough at the entrance to the room for three adults and two children, but not for the others).

"Wonkavision! My latest and greatest invention," Wonka explained the next room, which was dominated by what appeared to be a giant camera. Mike had spoken over Wonka to explain how TV worked (and he would know), and Wonka had explained his plans to do something similar with chocolate. In a completely impossible manner, of course, which was becoming expected for all things Wonka. The children watched with amazement as Wonka pointed his giant camera at an equally giant Wonka Bar, causing it to disappear in a rush of tiny pieces through the air above their heads, only to reappear as a normal sized bar of chocolate (a hundred times smaller than its original size) in what Wonka called a television. But Charlie had never seen any TV that you could reach into and pull things out of, and the other children and the parent seemed equally baffled. Mike had been immediately interested and had ignored his mother's panicked cries (Wonka hadn't bothered to make any attempt to stop him beyond a token effort Mike couldn't even be expected to hear). In a flash, he had fiddled with the position of the camera, pointing it to focus on a human instead of a giant chocolate bar, before the other children had pulled him aside. It was Mr. Beauregarde's comment about "It's not a camera, it's some kind of Star Trek transporter, and those screw up all the time!" that seemed to make Mike question if it was such a clever idea.

As they left the Wonkavision room, Wonka seemed to forget he even had a tour group, instead focusing on bills, letters, and other paperwork requiring his attention, only stopping briefly to dismiss them with "I hope you enjoyed yourselves, excuse me for not showing you out."

"What happened? Did we do something wrong?" Charlie looked around at the other kids, and pointedly remembered the bottle of Fizzy Lifting Drink he and Grandpa Joe had been close to purloining. Augustus wrung his hands, thinking of the beautiful (and delicious) chocolate river he had sullied, and would have been pulled under. Violet recalled the gum she had snatched out of Wonka's hand after being warned not to touch anything and had nearly been turned into a giant blueberry of all things. Veruca remembered her ill-advised tantrum with the geese, Mike thought of his disregard for safety of himself or Wonka's Wonkavision.

"I don't know Charlie," Grandpa Joe replied, and looked at the other assorted parents who nodded and straightened their backs to fall into line behind him as he strode toward the door Wonka had vanished behind, "but we're gonna find out."

They had approached Wonka as a group, parents concerned about what their children had been promised, to make sure of the details of the lifetime supply of chocolate. And Wonka had lit into their children, yelling about befouled chocolate rivers, scared geese that wouldn't lay for days, children forcing themselves into his experiments long before they were ready for humans, and stolen Fizzy Lifting Drink.

"So you get nothing! You lose! Good day gentlemen, ladies!"

Mrs. Teevee was the first to take offense. "You're a thief! A dirty rotten shyster!"

"A common fraud, using these children for publicity and not making good on his end of the deal," Sam Beauregarde chimed in.

"You low-down dirty double-crosser! Do you have any idea who my lawyers are Wonka? I'll own you for this! I'm gonna take that chocolate out of you in court!" Mr. Salt was clearly used to threatening legal action, but having to do so in response to a slight against his daughter filled him with rage and vigor.

"He's a crook. He's a cheat and a swindler, that's what you are!" Grandpa Joe leaned in to yell back in Wonka's face. "How can you do a thing like this? Build up these childrens' hopes and then smash their dreams to pieces! You're an inhuman monster!"

Grandpa Joe stormed past the other parents, saying outright that they would go to Slugworth. Mrs. Teevee agreed with him, saying Mr. Slugworth would clearly be more trustworthy than Wonka had proven to be, and would likely pay well for the Gobstoppers Wonka had given them and everything else they could tell about his factory. The children were caught in-between, fully upset about not getting the promised chocolate… but also feeling that they had done wrong. Veruca, who had never actually been in a position to break somebody's trust before (as nobody had bothered to trust such a spoiled brat with anything important) clearly didn't like the feeling and was the first to throw her Gobstopper onto Wonka's desk, bouncing it into the middle of the letter Wonka was writing. Mike and Violet did the same, and then Augustus. Charlie was the last to place his Gobstopper into the pile the other children had formed, the knobs extending out of the Gobstoppers forming a bizarre pyramid shape. But before the children had a chance to follow their parents out of the office, Wonka finally spoke again.

"How far that little candle shines his beams! So shines a good deed in a weary world," he said, spinning his chair around. "Children, my dear children, you did it! I didn't think I would see the day, but Willy Wonka was proven wrong! You dear children, you've all won!"

Needless to say, the children were confused, the adults were confused, even Wonka's hat tipped to one side of the half a hat rack it sat on as if it was confused.

And so, Wonka explained his plan. He was getting older and had wanted to find someone to take over his factory while there was still time to train them to do it right. A child, who would further his ideals, instead of trying to override them. But there was only, could only ever be one Willy Wonka. He had sought out children who embodied the things he felt were most important to his business. It was an easy enough matter to ensure that the tickets ended up in the hands of his handpicked successor candidates, it was a little-known fact that many candy shop proprietors across the world worked directly for Wonka. He picked Augustus Gloop, who loved eating candy, and had already set out on the path to make candy as delicious, or more, as that made by Wonka himself. Violet Beauregarde, raised on the knee of a shrewd cutthroat businessman and poised to be every bit as competitive as her father. Veruca Salt, the heiress to one of the richest and most successful industrialists, already a skilled financial wizard, who could do magic with nickels and dimes. Mike Teevee, clever and in tune with innovative technologies, having a knack for how to best use them for promotion. And Charlie Bucket, who loved the Wonka brand with his heart and soul and knew what it was to have nothing. He had expected that only one of these children (and he admitted in a stage whisper everybody could hear that he had been certain it would be Charlie) would make it to the end of the tour without an incident causing their removal. He hadn't been certain any of them, even Charlie, could pass his final test, to resist the temptation to spite Wonka and give the Everlasting Gobstoppers to Slugworth (who had turned out to actually be one of Wonka's employees, whose real name was Wilkinson). And all five children, despite their own disillusionment with the man, despite their parents anger and their own frustration, had done the right thing, not just refusing to sell Wonka out, but had actually given the priceless candies back to him.

They had to forgo a ride in the Great Glass Wonkavator, there were just far too many people left, but Wonka's excitement refused to abate, and he promised each child a future trip on the grand elevator that could go sideways, slantways, longways, backways, and frontways. And so much more.

Of course, all good things come to an end. The children and their families did have to leave the Wonka factory later that day and return to school. Mr. Wonka had told them they were free to tell about everything they had seen, save for the Oompa-Loompas, whose existence he felt was best hidden for their own protection. In time, the children grew older, and the Wonka Candy Company paid for their college educations. Culinary school and business administration and accounting and all sorts of other courses. But just as important as classroom education, perhaps even more important to Wonka himself, was experience in the field, and all five children spent summers at the factory, learning Wonka's secrets, befriending the Oompa-Loompas and learning their language and about their country, a harsh land they had been more than happy to leave behind, especially for the high pay offered by Wonka, helping with Wonka's inventions.

And where Augustus might have been overcome by his desire to eat instead of keeping a clear head and the company's best interests in mind, where Violet might have been too competitive and damaged the Wonka brand, where Veruca might have put money ahead of the well being of the company's employees, where Mike might have rushed in impetuously instead of thinking about the best course of action, where Charlie might have been overcome by his sincere but unrealistic desire to make everybody happy, instead the five kept each other afloat, bolstering their strengths and making up for their weaknesses. While the Wonka company under its namesake's ownership had flourished, it soared to ever greater heights under the management of the new five-way partnership that took over when Wonka finally retired. Willy Wonka was proud to admit that he had been wrong. Wonka Candy would have been in good hands if Charlie Bucket had won, but it was in great hands with all five of them.

Wonka was also forced to admit that Augustus's creation, a bar of dark chocolate with chopped up cherries mixed throughout and a wafer thin salty pretzel core, really was better than his own Whipple-Scrumptious Fudgemallow. But that would stay his little secret.


End file.
